Sriracha and gochujang are so last year.
No need to toss them away yet. Asian sauces were still trending at the 2025 Summer Fancy Food Show, but specialty food producers are increasingly looking to other parts of the world for saucy inspiration.
Sauces were among the dominant products showcased at the Show, which runs from Sunday through Tuesday at New York City’s Javits Center. And many of the exhibitors incorporated ingredients—especially chili peppers—from global locales.
Sauces made with ingredients sourced from farms in South Africa. | Photo by Pat Cobe.
A company called African Dream offered several spicy sauces, all using ingredients sourced from small farms in South Africa. The hottest ones include African Ghost Pepper; Habanasco made with aged, fermented habaneros; Jalanasco with aged, fermented jalapeños; and Bird’s Eye Chilli sauce. There were also several variations on peri-peri sauce, made famous by fast-casual Nando’s Peri-Peri, but one of the more unique entries was a Southern Braai, a traditional South African barbecue sauce made with fermented milder red peppers.
Berbere, an Ethiopian chili pepper blend, is being produced by Red Fox Spices. It’s made from sun-dried chili peppers from a family farm in Fenote Selam, then combined with other spices such as ginger, nigella seeds and garlic. Though not a sauce itself, blending berbere seasoning with liquid is the base for the Ethiopian red sauce known as “awaze.”
Moving across to the Western hemisphere, Peru is having more of a presence in the sauce world. Aji amarillo (yellow peppers) and rocoto peppers are flavoring sauces from Tari, part of parent Alicorp USA. The Rocoto Pepper Hot Sauce has a bit more fire than the Amarillo Pepper “Hot-ish” Sauce, but both lend a more complex heat. For foodservice operators, Tari markets the sauces in single-serve packets to put at a condiment bar as well as squeeze bottles for drizzling.
Peruvian peppers thrive on Long Island, New York, for this seed-to-sauce line. | Photo by Pat Cobe.
Springs Fireplace is a company that grows Peruvian peppers out in Long Island, New York, and makes farm-to-table hot sauces in varieties including Aji Mango and Aji Peach. The supplier also bottles Tesuque Hot Sauce using a New Mexican chili variety.
According to the story behind Amazon hot sauces, the company has been cultivating a variety of peppers in Colombia since the 1990s, including the Amazon chili as well as cayenne, jalapenos, habaneros, Scotch Bonnet and Jolokias or ghost peppers. These are crafted along with “rainforest herbs and spices” into a range of sauces, from the mild Pineapple Mango to the fiery Green Amazon.
Zigzagging back to Asia is a line of sambals from Auria’s Malaysian Kitchen. There’s Mango Sambal, Hot Chilli Sambal and Lime Leaf Sambal, each with a varying degree of heat. A sambal is basically a chili-based paste or thick sauce that can be used as a condiment but also as an ingredient in Southeast Asian dishes. Owner Auria Abraham grew up in Malaysia and produces the sambals in small batches in New York City from authentic recipes. Foodservice-size packages are available, too.
Auria's Malaysian Kitchen has a line of small-batch sambals. | Photo courtesy of Auria's Malaysian Kitchen.
While Korean gochujang has gotten a lot of attention in restaurant kitchens, Korean sauces are taking off in new directions. One exhibitor that is a supplier of kimchi is using that fermented cabbage prep as the starting point for a sauce. Mama O’s Kimchili Sauce is red in color and comes in regular and super-spicy versions. It has a hot-tangy flavor profile rather than hot-sweet, and comes in foodservice-size pouches as well as consumer-size bottles.
Mama O's Kimchili Sauce comes in foodservice-size pouches. | Photo by Pat Cobe.
Global mashups were also represented in the Fancy Food aisles. A yellow pepper sauce with a Caribbean twist is Tropical Amarillo from Heatonist Hot Ones. It features African fatali and Scotch bonnet peppers blended with pineapple and mango, with undertones of curry, mustard and onion.
Particularly intriguing was Tabañero, which offers a Curry Habanero sauce. The company makes its vinegar-free sauces from carrots, onions, garlic, key lime juice, red habanero peppers and agave nectar; other varieties such as Peach Bourbon and the simply named Sweet & Spicy reflect the popular sweet-heat flavor profile.
Speaking of sweet-heat, none other than David Chang’s Momofuku retail product arm has jumped onto the swicy trend. The restaurant’s branded line of sauces includes Momofuku Chili Crunch with hot honey and Sweet & Spicy Korean BBQ Sauce.
And Nate’s Nectar, a small family-owned honey producer out of Ohio, is adding a bit of creative complexity to the hot honey tsunami. There’s chipotle pepper-infused Smoked Honey and ghost pepper-infused Stingin’ Honey.
Judging from the exhibitors at the Show, hot honey is here to stay for a while, and these line extensions make it interesting.
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